


The Madness Within

by shine_alive (orphan_account)



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Asphyxiation, Death Eater shaming, Dubious Consent, Humiliation, M/M, Master/Slave, Rape, Rentboys, Slavery, Violence, Whipping, dub-con, non-con
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-06-05
Updated: 2014-06-05
Packaged: 2018-02-03 11:39:17
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,295
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1743356
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/shine_alive
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“We’ve all got light and dark in us.” As Christmas approaches, Harry brings a miserable, ostracised Draco from the streets to his home, demanding obedience in return. The world still sees Harry as a faultless saviour, but Draco finds something far more disturbing beneath the surface.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Madness Within

**Author's Note:**

> **Title** : The Madness Within  
>  **Prompt** : 79 - Released from Azkaban a few weeks before Christmas, Draco will do anything to ensure he’s not homeless for the holidays.  
>  **Pairing** : Harry/Draco  
>  **Rating** : NC-17  
>  **Warnings** : Dubcon, bondage, bloodplay, violence, D/s themes, psychological trauma, humiliation, Death Eater shaming, dark!Harry  
>  **Disclaimer** : Harry Potter characters are the property of J.K. Rowling and Bloomsbury/Scholastic. No profit is being made, and no copyright infringement is intended.  
>  **Word Count** : 7 400  
>  **Summary** : “We’ve all got light and dark in us.” As Christmas approaches, Harry brings a miserable, ostracised Draco from the streets to his home, demanding obedience in return. The world still sees Harry as a faultless saviour, but Draco finds something far more disturbing beneath the surface.  
>  **Author’s Note** : [](http://susannah-wilde.livejournal.com/profile)[**susannah_wilde**](http://susannah-wilde.livejournal.com/) , I may have gotten a bit carried away with your dark!Harry request. I did have a bit of fun with your prompt and hope that you enjoy reading this as much as I did writing it. Thanks to [](http://who-la-hoop.livejournal.com/profile)[](http://who-la-hoop.livejournal.com/)**who-la-hoop** for brilliant beta-ing!

The cold bit into Draco’s skin with every step. He shivered as it stung his skin through his trousers and dress shirt, which were soaked with snowmelt; he suspected the very cloth was freezing. He’d worn the same outfit for the past seven months: to his own trial, straight to Azkaban, and now, here.

Azkaban. He shivered again. The most terrible prison in the wizarding world had not been this cold. In his dank cell, he could curl up against the walls of stone and imagine himself somewhere else to keep the Dementors at bay: Malfoy Manor before the Dark Lord had seized it as his own; his room, with house-elves bringing him a hot meal; Hogwarts, with the inane chatter of young, foolish wizards.

Draco had nothing after his release – his wand had been confiscated long ago and his worn clothes provided no protection against the November chills. A visit to the Malfoy vault in Gringotts revealed that only a few Sickles remained of the family fortune. The goblin accompanying him told him dispassionately that Narcissa had given the Manor and most of the fortune to the Ministry in reparations. She’d spent the rest to reduce Draco’s sentence; however, after hearing rumours that he had been Kissed, she’d abruptly left the country.

The first thing Draco did after being released was spend some money buying a cheap scarf from a street seller – he’d never visited one of those before in his life – and the rest went on a hot meal. Then he visited every building in Diagon Alley and Knockturn Alley, begging for work. Diagon Alley’s storeowners had recoiled from him in horror, one woman even expelling him from her store with magic. Knockturn Alley’s unsavoury merchants had sneered at him, seeing nothing but a once-great name, fallen from grace.

He had not eaten for four days now, and earlier today, he lost his scarf in a tussle with a few young toughs who hexed him for good measure. Snow had begun to fall around midday and only piled up higher and higher as night fell, and no happy thoughts could make him warm. This cold was a debilitating, bone-chilling cold that gave him no choice but to curl up beside a closed shop and wrap his arms around himself.

The cold was now moving down his limbs to grip his organs. With a sudden lucidity that he had not felt for months, Draco let out the breath he had been holding and resolved to die tonight.

The cold beckoned him to sleep; the wind played a lullaby. He began to doze….

“Malfoy?”

A familiar voice wrenched him from inviting darkness. He tilted his head up and saw a bespectacled face hovering above his, all sharp angles and wilful lines and piercing green eyes.

“Potter,” he croaked.

Harry Potter straightened, stuffing his hands into the pockets of his long (warm) coat. “So it is you,” he said. “I never thought I’d ever see a Malfoy in this state—” he gestured in Draco’s general direction with a nod “—in this sort of place.”

In the past, when Draco visited Knockturn Alley with his father, Lucius Malfoy would make derisive remarks and sneer at the seemingly cowed, dirty folk who would stay hidden during the day and only come out at night to sell illegal wares, potions, and sex – the means by which they continued to survive.

Now, Draco wondered if a cock in his mouth and a hot meal in his stomach would really be so bad.

As if he could hear his thoughts, Potter smiled – a neutral smile, portending no kindness or ill will – and stooped down to study Draco for a few minutes, the edges of his black coat brushing the layer of snow accumulating on the ground. Draco, uncomfortable under the intensity of his stare, focused his eyes on Potter’s sleeve.

Finally, Potter spoke. “You’re dying, Malfoy. Would you like to live?”

Draco pulled himself to a more upright position and spat, “Of course I'd like to live. What kind of a question is that?”

“I could bring you home. You’d get a hot bath, food to eat – you’re looking quite bony, you know – and—”

“What do you want?” Malfoy asked, cutting Potter off mid-sentence. His voice was quiet, heavy. “You’re the saviour of the wizarding world, the Boy Who Lived, I even owe you for your testimony – but you’ve never been particularly generous.”

Potter froze for a moment before exhaling and smiling, a strange glint in his eyes. “Observant as always, Malfoy,” he said lightly. “As for payment, we can discuss it later.”

Malfoy sighed. “Please get it over with now.”

“It’s easy enough – it should be, for you. I simply need you to submit to me and do as I say.”

Draco felt his lip curl in a smirk. “You don’t have enough house-elves at your place, then?”

“You’d be something more than a house-elf, but I’d appreciate that sort of help as well.”

They were just parrying with words, stalling. Draco was not stupid; he knew what Potter was after. For a second, he saw Lucius in the back of his head, white-faced and twisted with rage that his son, his beloved pureblood son, had stooped so low as to entertain this offer made by none less than Harry Potter.

Potter stood. “I haven’t all night,” he said, voice a bit harder now. He held out his arm. “As long as you do my bidding, I’ll provide you with a place to stay and food to eat and everything else you might possibly need. Take it or leave it, Malfoy. I must say, even after all that’s happened between us, I’d hate to see you die.”

Jibes. Humiliation. A broken nose. _Sectumsempra._ They were lifetimes ago.

Shaking slightly, Draco rose to his feet and took a deep breath, leaving his pride in tattered remains on the ground. He reached out a tentative hand and Potter nodded. His fingers closed around Potter’s warm, strong wrist.

The world spun, distorting and squeezing together – into black.

 

~ * ~ * ~

 

A hand ran down his face, warming the icy skin. He lay on his back on the softest surface he’d felt in weeks. With some effort, he pried his stiff, heavy eyes open.

Potter’s face met his, unsmiling but not unpleased, and he withdrew his hand.

“There you are. Apparating proved a bit too much.” He backed away from the couch, and Draco sat up. “Feeling all right?”

Draco opened his mouth to speak, but an intense growl interrupted him. His face flushed, heat running up from his cheeks to the roots of his hair “Hungry. Obviously,” he muttered.

“I expected as much.” Potter disappeared into the kitchen and re-emerged with a plate of eggs, bacon, and beans.

Draco tried to hold on to his manners, but they slipped away with the first bite and he began shovelling food into his mouth, consumed by the ache in his stomach.

He had finished off three-quarters of the plate when he noticed Potter’s gaze, fixed on him. The glint was back.

“Why are you staring like that, Potter?”

Potter snorted. “That was surprisingly civil, Malfoy. I expected something along the lines of _didn’t your mother teach you not to stare?_ ”

“Yes, well,” Draco mumbled, not wanting to bring back memories of his stupid, younger self. “What with recent events, I’ve rather forgotten all the – the other things—”

“Not everyone had the luxury of forgetting.”

Draco jumped to his feet. “Azkaban was not a luxury,” he snapped. “You wouldn’t know half the things that go on behind the bars there! Oh, no, the Chosen One would never be caught somewhere like that, he mustn’t sully his saintly self and his father’s great Patronus with—”

In a flash, Potter was on his feet as well. “You forget your place,” he snarled, his expression hardening into a face that Draco had never seen before, even at the height of his taunts towards Potter before the battle. “You are here to obey me, not to insult, not to make any judgments except those I tell you to make.” He grabbed Draco’s shirt and shook him hard. “Do you understand?”

Not trusting his voice, Draco nodded.

Potter’s grip on him loosened, and Draco relaxed until a single word full of surety and authority sent shivers down his spine.

“Kneel.”

Draco’s knees automatically locked at the demeaning command coming from Potter, of all people.

“I said kneel.”

The wind outside howled, and the house creaked audibly with its force.

Draco’s knees softened and gave in, and he slowly sank to the floor in front of Potter, looking anywhere but straight ahead.

Potter walked around him in a very slow, deliberate circle. Draco felt his eyes run over his dirty, scuffed state and wished he could hide.

“Good. Stand.” Draco obeyed.

“Go and take a shower – a very long one, if you prefer. But after you are finished, I expect you here, ready to take orders.” He raised his eyebrows at Draco. “Is that understood?”

“Yes.”

“Yes, sir.”

For a moment, Draco’s treacherous tongue wanted to spit out _there’s no need to call me ‘sir’_. He bit his lip and took a deep breath before responding. “Yes, sir.”

“Very good.” Potter settled back down on the couch and flipped idly through a copy of the Daily Prophet, skimming the Quidditch section. “You may leave your clothes in the bathroom. No need to get dressed when you come back down.”

 

~ * ~ * ~

 

After months of hunger, cold, and filth, a hot shower on a full stomach felt heavenly. Draco simply stood under the spray for a half hour, revelling in the near-scalding heat flowing down his body. He washed his hair at three times, and when he finally ran his fingers through wet, soft, white-blond locks, he felt almost human again.

Then he started on his body, squeezing a generous dollop of soap on his palm and rubbing it over his skin.

Draco's body was no longer the beautiful, lean, strong figure the Death Eaters had all coveted. Voldemort had gifted him to one after the other as a reward for some loyal service. It humiliated him, shamed Lucius and Narcissa, and brought Voldemort a sadistic sort of pleasure.

Under the spray and rivulets of foam, his fingers trailed past his nipples and down his flat, soft stomach. He cleaned his prick thoroughly, carefully keeping his mind blank; he didn't want Potter to see him already hard.

Potter. His mind dwelled on him as his hands moved to lather his arse. Why was he living alone, instead of spending time with Weasley and Granger? The Golden Trio – his face twisted in a sneer at the memory of that nickname – had been inseparable at school. Even if there’d been a falling out, the Boy Who Wouldn't Die should still be spending his nights with someone: one of his many beautiful admirers, or even the youngest Weasley with her offensively red hair.

Not with the despicable Draco Malfoy, disgrace to the name of wizard, ex-Death Eater. The remnants of the Dark Mark, still stark against his otherwise unmarred skin, seemed to agree.

Finally, he stepped out of the shower and dried his slightly pink skin with a soft towel. He shook out his wet hair before towelling it, splattering the walls with water; he felt a little sorry for the mess, but only a little.

The cool air prickled his exposed skin as he descended the stairs – he had nothing but the towel around his hips. Potter, still on the sofa, looked up from the book in his lap as he approached. The flames from the fireplace danced shadows across his sharp features. Draco felt his gaze roam his body and flushed, keeping his eyes down.

“You look much more like yourself,” Potter commented, coming to Draco and brushing a stray lock of light hair out of his face. “Much better, don't you think?” Draco didn't speak, too preoccupied with fighting the sensation of Potter's long, cool fingers trailing down his jaw.

The fingers disappeared, replaced a moment later with a sudden, stinging slap.

Draco's head snapped to the side sharply, and it took a moment for him to register the prickling pain on his cheek, the reactionary tears automatically welling up in his eyes.

“Look at me,” Potter commanded, and Draco lifted his gaze. “When I ask you a question, you respond. Do you understand?”

“Yes, sir,” Draco replied, trying to keep his voice steady.

Potter turned away and pulled his wand from his pocket, pointing it at Draco.

_“Incarcerous.”_

Ropes suddenly bound his wrists and pulled his ankles apart, and he fought to keep his balance. The towel fell from his hips, forgotten. Potter raised his wand and lifted him a few inches into the air by the ropes so that he could not stand on solid ground.

Potter's hands trailed down his sternum and down his ribs, brushing each distinct one. He hummed noncommittally and moved lower past the sharp jut of Draco’s hip bones – then lower still.

Draco tried to do away with desire but could not stop the dizzying rush of blood to his prick or the moan that escaped his throat. Potter stroked him firm and sure, skin against sensitive skin, and he let out a strained whimper as his prick swelled in Potter’s hand, the head dark and wet. He could not help the little stutter his hips gave as he twitched with arousal.

He came a few seconds later, face red with shame at his inability to hold out – not that he was to blame, he thought briefly, considering how long he’d gone without proper human contact.

Potter slashed his wand through the air and the bindings disappeared, dropping Draco unceremoniously to his knees on the carpet. When he looked up at Potter, he immediately wished he hadn’t.

“You came without my permission,” Potter said quietly, every word dropping like a stone in Draco’s stomach. He spelled a Cleaning Charm on his forearm dirtied with Draco’s come, never breaking his stare.

“I wasn’t aware I needed permission,” Draco replied. “Sir,” he added hastily.

“Malfoy, you’ve always been intelligent.” Potter was behind him now, trailing his wand lightly across his shoulder blades. “Why did you presume you could take your pleasure before mine without my permission?”

“I—” Draco closed his eyes. “I don’t know, sir.”

“That’s too bad, then.” Potter tapped him on the lower back with his wand. “On your hands and knees. Head down, arse up.”

Fate was having a laugh. A year ago Draco would have dismissed anyone who might tell him that he would have his cheek against the carpet, arms splayed around his head, bottom high in the air, entirely at Potter’s mercy. Now, even in this utterly embarrassing position, he felt no indignation. He’d surrendered too much in too short a time, and surrendering to Potter came too easily after all the trials of the past year.

 _“Prolixo Flagellum.”_ The wand in Potter's hand stretched and loosened into a whip, which he trailed against Draco’s skin, obviously relishing the shiver that ran the length of his spine. “You will count them, Draco.”

The first strike falling across his arse shocked more than hurt him, and he said, in a steady voice, “One.” Subsequent lashes came quickly, and he counted as quickly as he could to keep up. “Two – three – four…”

By the tenth hit, he started to cringe in pain every time the lash came down, and his voice wavered.

By the twenty-fifth, tears started to drip down Draco’s face, while blood dripped down the backs of his thighs.

Potter stopped around thirty or thirty-two. His whip shrank back to a wand, which he placed on the ground. He tangled his fingers in Draco’s soft damp hair and grabbed handfuls of it in an unforgiving grip, pressing the aristocratic line of Draco’s nose against his erection.

“Suck,” he commanded.

Draco undid the front of Potter's trousers, sliding them down his legs while Potter slipped his sweater over his head and tossed it irreverently behind him. He pulled the boxers down to release Potter’s fully erect prick, which curved up toward his belly.

Draco closed his eyes and wrapped his lips over the head before sliding more of Potter down his throat. He swallowed over half of his length, as far as he could, before pulling back and diving back in. A groan from the man above him affirmed that he was doing something right. He sucked and licked, wearing away the salty taste of the skin with his own tongue, a mix of saliva and pre-come dribbling from the corner of his own mouth. With every breath, he took in Potter's heady scent.

“That's enough,” Potter finally said, shoving Draco off him with a harsh tug.

Draco heard the opening and shutting of drawers behind him and felt fingers spreading his arse cheeks apart; he clenched his teeth, trying not to protest the firm grasp on his sore skin. A slick finger prodded its way inside him, teasing the sensitive entrance before pushing inside with a dirty slurping sound. He squirmed to alleviate the discomfort, only to be stilled with a sharp slap on his stinging backside. Another finger joined the first, pumping in and out shallowly, and then a third. Draco felt stretched painfully wide as Potter twisted his fingers inside him, and then gasped as a flare of pleasure emerged from the pain.

“Ah,” Potter said, sounding bemused. “Found it.”

He withdrew his fingers then, and Draco tried not to regret their disappearance. However, the thought scarcely had the time to cross his head before something thicker pressed against his entrance, breaching it.

Potter shoved his length in him in one movement with a breathy moan, scarcely giving him enough time to adjust before pulling back out and thrusting back in. He built up a relentless rhythm, thrusting and withdrawing while Draco bent like a rag doll, supported only by Potter's bruising grip on his waist.

“Hurts,” he choked out as Potter's sharp hipbones slammed into his sore arse cheeks with bruising force.

Potter only replied, “Good.”

Despite the pain, however, Draco found himself becoming aroused again. If he ignored how pathetic he felt, he could focus on the way Potter shifted his position every few minutes until he found the angle that struck Draco's prostate. He found his own prick hardening again, his balls tightening, even though he still gritted his teeth in pain every time Potter's hips slammed against him.

Potter reached around him and grabbed his prick roughly, feeling its full hardness. “Insatiable, aren't we?”

“Yes, sir,” Draco fortunately had the presence of mind to reply.

Potter withdrew his hand and reached for his wand. “ _Carpe Retractum,_ ” he breathed, and Draco felt something like a rope materialize around his neck. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw his skin lit up as a line of light connected his neck to the wand. This was no rope – it was, he remembered bitterly, one of Aunt Bellatrix’ favourite tricks.

“You want to come, Draco?” The way Harry groaned out his name, voice tight, edged Draco on towards his own climax as he mumbled an affirmation.

“You have to beg for it.” Potter drew his arm tight, and the magical restraints yanked Draco's neck back, restricting his air and forcing his spine into an arch he'd never thought it capable of making. “Beg for it or you won't come.”

“Please, sir,” Draco rasped out, shaking as he tried to hold his position without breaking his back. Harry fucked him furiously now, his breath coming in gasps. “Let me come, please, I’ll – I’ll do anything, please, I want to—” He groaned out again as Harry pulled the rope back even further. The top of his head brushed against Potter's strong shoulder.

His balls ached, throbbed with the nearly unbearable need for release. Draco squeezed his eyes shut as he keened through his clenched teeth, determined not to come until told to.

After a few more moments of Draco choking out pleas that fell on seemingly deaf ears, Potter leaned, his lips grazing the blond man’s earlobe. “You may come. _Finite Incantatem.”_

With his bindings gone, Draco pitched forward onto his hands and came simultaneously, arms trembling with the effort of holding himself up as he emptied himself on the carpet. While he groaned from the pleasure gripping his body, Potter slammed into him at a furious pace. Draco braced himself against the floor, rocking back against the thrusts until Potter suddenly withdrew from inside him and stood, moving in front of him.

There were red smears on the outside of Potter’s hipbones, but Draco did not have time to think about them before Potter nudged his lips apart with the head of his prick.

“Suck me off.”

Draco obediently opened his lips, his jaw slack from the weakness that washed over him after his climax. It didn’t take long for Potter to come down his throat, only a few licks around the tip of his cock. Draco tried to swallow every drop of Potter’s hot, thick spurts.

After a few moments of catching his breath, Potter spoke again. “You may go to your room now. Upstairs, end of the hallway on the left.” He paused. “I expect you downstairs tomorrow morning.”

Draco stood on unsteady legs, inexplicably embarrassed at his exposed body. “Yes, sir,” he replied, climbing back up the stairs while tightly gripping the worn wooden bannister. At the top of the stairs he glanced behind himself, and saw Potter still standing naked, tall, cleaning Draco’s come from the carpet with a charm.

The room Potter gave him could have fit in his old quarters in Malfoy Manor several times over, but he had to admit that there was a comforting quality to it. The lights, though bright, were also warm and soft. The small wardrobe had a set of wizard robes in it that had been worn before – although by whom, Draco could not tell. And the mirror—

Draco turned around in the mirror and drew in a sharp breath through his teeth when he saw the damage that had been done to his backside. Numerous lacerations crossed the skin there, and dried spots decorated the tops of his inner thighs, no doubt smeared by Potter’s ruthless pounding. He felt a little sick but could not tear his gaze away from the sticky crimson on his backside.

Eventually, he resigned himself to sleeping on his stomach. A most uncomfortable position, he thought as he crawled under the covers, but as soon as his head hit the softest pillow he’d ever felt, Draco fell into a deep sleep.

 

~ * ~ * ~

 

The next day, Draco learned exactly what it was that Harry Potter did with his time.

“You still want to be an Auror? After everything?”

Potter flipped a page of the document he was reading. “Because of everything, more like.”

“Oh?”

Green eyes flickered up from rows of text to meet his. “Go and make me a sandwich first.”

 _I’m not a house-elf,_ Draco wanted to object, but bit back the retort. “Yes. Sir.”

“Make yourself one, too,” Potter called after him. “I need you to put some meat back on your bones.”

Over a light meal of sandwiches – he’d made them surprisingly well, considering that he’d never prepared food in his life – Draco learned that Hogwarts could not yet accept students again. The battle had the grand edifice in ruins, and it would take reconstruction teams an estimated two years to fix it again. Some parents of school-aged wizards and witches sent their children abroad, but most could not afford it.

“The Ministry set up a temporary school in their building,” Potter explained. “Most of the teachers remained – well, the ones that survived. I share the Defence Against the Dark Arts post with Ron and Hermione. It’s all temporary, of course. Professor McGonagall’s staying on as Headmistress.” Potter stood abruptly, his eyes meeting Draco’s for a moment before he pushed his chair back. “And I’ve a meeting with her soon. Feel free to entertain yourself or eat. I’ll be back sometime tonight.”

Before Draco had a chance to reply, Potter had disappeared down the hall and out the front door. A few moments later, he heard a muffled crack from outside.

Draco took his time exploring the house – after all, Potter hadn’t forbidden him from doing so. He found a wall in one room with portraits of the Black family – his mother, his aunt – with Sirius Black’s face scorched away. Some rooms were in a dreadful state, as if looters had gone through them; others had the distinct feeling of care and upkeep, as did Draco’s room and the living quarters down the stairs.

This, Draco realized, must have been the heart of Voldemort’s – and his family’s – demise. The famous Order of the Phoenix would have made their headquarters here, he was sure of it, although he had never been here before. The Death Eaters could not gain entry; some charm protected the place.

The realization did not plague Draco as it once might have. He ate some more, slept some more, glanced through Potter’s small but growing library of books – interestingly, many were on Transfiguration and Potions.

Nightfall came soon enough, and when Potter returned to the house, the elephant in the room from the night before was much more difficult to ignore. Potter shed his coat and slipped into his usual chair at the table. Both avoided the other’s eyes.

“Dinner’s ready,” Draco volunteered.

“That’d be great.”

Draco had already eaten, so while Potter ate his fill, he started washing the dishes that had accumulated over the day. Such a menial task done without magic should have felt demeaning, but Draco found it calming. Humbling, too; it reminded him of his fallen state. He smiled bitterly as he realized that he needed this humility if he wanted to stay in Potter’s home.

He came back to the dinner table just as Potter was finishing up. To alleviate the very pregnant pause, Draco tried to digress lightly on some light topic.

“You have many Transfiguration and Potions resources,” he commented.

“A brilliant observation, Malfoy,” Potter deadpanned, and took another bite of his food.

“Why?”

Potter chewed for a few moments and swallowed. “To be an Auror, of course. They’ve as good as accepted me, and they tell me I’ve already done brilliantly in the field with combat and defence. But McGonagall thinks my Transfiguration still needs work, and I’ve never been great at Potions for – reasons.”

“Ah, Auror training,” Draco murmured, trying to keep the wistfulness out of his own voice. If so many things hadn’t happened, if he hadn’t been pulled into the Dark Lord’s destructive plot, he might be in training himself.

“You know,” Draco said casually, “I could help you with Potions if you wanted, at least.”

Potter’s eyes bored into his, a hard flinty sort of glare, and Draco quickly backtracked. “I only meant that it would help you pass your N.E.W.T., or the Auror equivalent. I’ve always been decent at Potions. Snape said—”

The look on Potter’s face at Snape shut Draco up mid-sentence.

“Go to your room, and wait for me there,” Potter commanded quietly, and that tight control was somehow more threatening than full-blown fury.

Draco, knowing that he had made a mistake but not exactly what it was, moved to obey, inwardly berating himself for asking about training instead of the weather.

 

~ * ~ * ~

 

He waited upstairs for at least half an hour before Potter stormed in and shoved him against the wall by the window, grabbing for his throat.

Draco’s eyes flew wide open in alarm, and he tried to shout at Potter, to beg him to stop, but could only wheeze out broken syllables.

“You dared to mention him?”

Draco tried to pry away Potter’s hand around his neck while shaking his head desperately, disavowing everything, anything for the vice-like grip to ease.

“You were always his favourite student. And he was against you and your dad and your mum and your Dark Lord. Did it feel like betrayal when you discovered that he’d been against your disgusting, vile, treasonous lot?” Potter’s eyes pierced Draco with a cold fury he’d never seen. Ages ago, when he and his friends had taunted the Boy Who Lived about one thing or another, he always responded with a hot, scorching kind of anger.

But now – God, this man was mad.

The pressure on his windpipe disappeared and Draco sagged against the wall, gulping in huge breaths of air. Potter grasped Draco’s left arm, pinning it against the wall and shoving back the sleeve to expose the remnants of the Dark Mark against the pale, smooth skin of his forearm.

“Was it fun to play Death Eater? You were always the worst kind.” Potter traced the Mark with the tip of his wand, skimming along the curve of the skull, the bend of the snake. “A bloody coward who couldn’t even serve his lord properly, just tagged along and tried to be evil.”

“I didn’t want to!” Draco choked out, voice hoarse and haunted with the horrific memories of the past year. “I had no choice, Potter, you know I didn’t. He would have killed me! And my family, he would’ve killed them too—”

The back of Potter’s hand struck Draco’s cheek with such force that his head hung limp to one side, and tears welled in his wide grey eyes even though he fought to keep them back.

“That’s what they all said, Draco. He put me under the Imperius curse! He forced me to do this! I had no choice! Come off it. You were evil from the start.” His wand still traced the Mark, but now the wooden tip left a trail of parted flesh and blood in its wake. Draco, too numb to react to the pain, watched in horrified fascination as the skull and snake came back to life vividly, the blood dripping down black in the darkness of the room.

“I’m not evil,” he croaked.

“I’m sure,” Potter crooned sarcastically. “Poor little Draco, just another victim, he would never hurt a fly, oh no!” He jabbed the wand into Draco’s ripped flesh, twisting it, and Draco’s body convulsed with the pain while he bit back his cries. “You were just waiting for a chance to be a good boy and cast a Killing Curse. To torture people. To make your dear aunt proud and cast your first _Morsmordre_ —”

“No! No, you don’t, no—” Draco screamed with his eyes squeezed shut, but the images behind his eyelids wouldn’t leave. He heard the ghost of Bellatrix’s laugh as she cast the Dark Mark into the sky over the Muggle family he’d watched die. He saw his father with his handsome wand against the pattern on his white skin, summoning Voldemort yet again. He smelled Greyback’s putrid breath as the werewolf mounted him and took him, muttering something about the beautiful reward the Dark Lord had given him—

“Stop, please, please no, I can’t,” he whimpered as he sank to the floor.

Immediately, Potter dropped his wrist and took a step back. His face was unreadable once again, though his knuckles were white with his grip on his wand.

Slowly, deliberately, he spoke. “I will tell you this once, Malfoy. Once. You allowed me to take you into my home on the condition that you submit. If you’re unhappy with this arrangement, you can leave right now and never come back. If you want to stay, you will shut your mouth and never again ask me to stop.”

Draco knew he should leave, run far away from Potter and his newly acquired twistedness. The boy who used to be so nauseatingly good now took pleasure in hurting another and cutting him apart. And yet, with a glance out the window, he realized that he did not want to leave and face a cold, ignominious death again. Potter offered him a home and food and at least a little bit of care he’d be hard-pressed to find anywhere else.

Again, he saw his father in the back of his head, yelling at him to leave, to cling to his name, to walk away from Harry Potter, who had clearly gone insane.

“I’ll stay, sir,” he mumbled, shoving away Lucius’ memory forever. The disavowal of his pride and autonomy came easily, too easily. He could not even flush with shame at this point.

“Good.” Potter folded his arms and appraised him, taking in his swollen and bruising cheek, his sliced and bloody arm, his eyes lowered in obedience. He Vanished Draco’s clothes, leaving him cold and exposed. “Get on the bed.”

Draco clambered onto the soft mattress and rested on his elbows and knees, his breathing shallow as he tried to prepare himself.

This time, Potter took him without preamble – no stretching, no slicking up, no warning. Draco screamed himself raw as he felt his sensitive skin split apart by Potter’s dry cock engorged with blood and pulsing desire. Potter shoved Draco’s face into the sheets to muffle the cries, and Draco felt slippery wetness accumulate on the cloth, a mixture of his own tears and snot as he tried to find pleasure somewhere, anywhere.

Potter seemed to pound into Draco for an eternity, never relenting while he trembled with the effort of supporting his own weight on all fours. Though Draco tried, he could not become aroused, even when Potter’s deeper thrusts struck his prostate. The pain kept his cock limp. Potter never spoke, and silence, punctuated by the slap of balls against skin and wordless blubbering, pervaded.

Finally, when Draco was reduced to a limp whimpering mess on the bed, Potter came deep inside him with a satisfied groan.

Draco remained motionless, eyes open but unseeing, while Potter pulled out of his slick recess and left without a word. Though he hurt, no tears came; he’d cried himself dry a while ago. He wanted nothing more than to escape the evidence of Potter’s brutality and drive away his own ghosts, but the searing pain in his arse kept him awake.

 

~ * ~ * ~

 

For the next few days, Potter avoided touching Draco, which was a (pleasant) surprise. He Healed Draco’s arm and averted his gaze whenever Draco limped as he walked, trying to alleviate the pain from the harsh fucking that neither dared to mention.

During this time, Harry stayed home more; Hogwarts’ holidays had commenced, allowing him to launch himself into studying Transfiguration and Potions when he didn’t have to do whatever Aurors-in-training did.

Draco had found that Harry was much more normal during the day than at night. They held civil, sometimes even engaging, conversations over breakfast or lunch, though they avoided any topic that might bear unpleasant links to the Battle or the Malfoys’ misdeeds.

“What happened with the Wea—er, Ginny Weasley?” he asked one day, trying to sound casual. Shit, he’d almost said The Weaslette, a nickname-turned-habit among anyone who’d disliked Potter.

To his relief, Potter simply fixed his plate with an uncomfortable stare. “What do you mean?” he countered, before taking a very large bite.

“Well – I mean, she was obviously enamoured with you, and then you were together, and— Well, are you still seeing her?”

Potter chewed for a very long time.

“No, I’m not,” he finally replied, after swallowing his bite.

“May I ask why?”

“I wasn’t good for her,” he replied, stabbing a strawberry with his fork a bit too viciously. “She only ever saw me the way I let her see me – a good person. But the war made me bad, too. Especially at night, the memories are especially bad at night.” The strawberry was oozing red juice at this point. “I couldn’t stand the thought of accidentally hurting her. It was for her good, really.”

Draco nodded awkwardly. “So I’ve become your personal punching bag,” he murmured, then snapped back to alertness when Potter slit his eyes at him. “Not that I mind,” he added hastily. “I mean, I’m very – I’m thankful. Sir.”

Harry’s lips curled in a ghost of a smile. “Well, you’re not really good for much else anymore.”

 

~ * ~ * ~

 

The day before Christmas Eve, a few of Potter’s friends came over for dinner.

Potter sent Draco upstairs with a plate laden with food, instructing him to stay upstairs and pretend he didn’t exist while he entertained his guests. Draco, remaining completely silent, could hear muffled chatter and laughter from distinct voices.

Granger and Weasley were both there, as were Loony – Luna – Lovegood and Neville Longbottom, whose face and nauseating bravery still made him cringe. He knew their voices by heart from his days of spying and listening for the Dark Lord. The Weaslette – Ginny Weasley, he reminded himself – was also there, presumably with a new boyfriend whose voice he couldn’t identify.

He wondered what the lot of them would think if they could see what their beloved Harry was really like, how he hid his depravity under the guise of a brilliant up-and-coming Auror, ever the wizarding world’s hero. He imagined the horror on their faces when they saw the way he became a sneering, sadistic, green-eyed monster in the privacy and darkness of the night.

Ron Weasley must have said something particularly stupid, because the group downstairs erupted in laughter.

This, too, Draco could never have. In Hogwarts, in Slytherin House, while he rarely felt happy, he nearly always found contentment. He had people who were almost like friends – perhaps they never dared to stand up to him, but idolized him nonetheless. Crabbe and Goyle, his stupid partners-in-crime – Pansy Parkinson – Blaise Zabini – they were as close to friends as he’d ever had.

He’d never have them again, either.

After the guests left, Potter ordered him downstairs. He bent him over the dining table where his friends had sat moments ago and stripped him of his clothing. The hastily cast Lubrication Charm barely had time to take effect before he slammed into Draco in one swift motion.

This time differed from the last; Potter vocalized his pleasure, his hitched breaths and throaty groans filling the air, and those sounds aroused Draco as well. He felt Potter’s hand wrap around his half-hard prick and jerk insistently, and soon, both were coming as they fucked against the table.

Draco fell to his knees and thanked Potter, but the other simply turned and retreated into his study.

 

~ * ~ * ~

 

Potter had left the next morning, leaving Draco alone on Christmas Eve. Sometime in the evening, when it became evident that Potter would not be back by their regular dinnertime, he began to cook – out of boredom, he convinced himself, not stupid sentimentality – and had a rather successful meal ready late at night. (It was almost magical how one’s cooking skills improved with necessity.) He sat at his usual spot at the table, trying to forget how Potter had taken him with animalistic savagery the day before.

He didn’t have to wait long. A muffled crack sounded outside, and Potter entered the dining room a minute later.

“What’s the occasion?” he asked, tilting his head toward the table laden with traditional Christmas dishes as he took off his Ministry robes and tugged on a Muggle sweater.

Draco fought the urge to roll his eyes. “It’s Christmas Eve. Almost Christmas Day, really.”

“Oh, right, that it is.”

They ate quietly with only the sounds of silverware against plates filling the air. While Potter tucked in like a starving man, Draco paused with his fork halfway to his mouth, studying him.

Strange, it was, that Potter scarcely looked any different than he had when he arrived at Malfoy Manor a year ago when the Snatchers caught him along with Weasley and Granger. Cleaner, of course, and less frenzied, but still the same Harry Potter. Handsome too, yes, with his sharp features and keen eyes and perpetually tousled hair.

Draco’s transformation from pompous little shit to cowed Death Eater had etched itself permanently on his own face, with heavy lines drawing down the corners of his mouths and a furrow between his brow that had never been there before.

Potter’s depravity stayed hidden.

“Draco, you’re staring,” Potter said, startling him. “Why are you looking at me like that?”

“Nothing,” Draco answered hastily. “It’s just… You can’t tell, but you’ve changed.”

Slowly, Potter set his fork down. “And you haven’t?”

“Of course I have. You know I have.” Draco clenched his fists and took a deep breath. “I want to apologize for what I did when we were still at school. You didn’t deserve any of that, and I – I realize now that I was wrong. We were wrong. I’m sorry.”

Potter’s lips thinned. “You don’t know half the things I went through in this war,” he growled, and Draco realized that he’d spoken wrongly yet again. “I had to destroy Voldemort’s soul. I saw the place my parents died. I got caught, I got hurt, I went hungry, I fucking died, I – Why do you think I would even remember the shit you did?”

“Potter, wait, I didn’t—”

“You think getting my nose broken by you mattered in the end? It didn’t even matter that you’d called Hermione a Mudblood, not after all that you lot actually went out and did—”

“That’s not what I—”

“SHUT UP!” Potter roared, standing and slamming his fists on the table. Humanity had once again disappeared from his glinting eyes. He glared at Draco a moment longer before whirling around and storming up the stairs.

Draco tried to quell his quaking insides, playing mindlessly with a bit of Christmas pudding, mangling it with his fork. Though over half the dinner remained, he no longer felt hungry – he had no appetite.

Eventually, he gathered what little courage he had left and followed Potter up the stairs.

Draco found Potter in his room to the right of the stairs, staring out the window. He stopped short a few paces behind him, watching his shoulders heave as he took a deep breath. Neither spoke for a few minutes.

“Potter—” Draco began.

“Shut up,” Potter snapped.

Draco sighed, but ignored him. “I didn’t mean to imply anything. I know a lot of things happened to you in the war, and I know you’re many times braver than I am, everyone knows it, I just wanted you to know that I’m different now. That I know I was stupid before.”

Potter turned and gave him a hard look. “You’re not different.”

Unthinkingly, he reached for Potter’s elbow. “Harry, please, the war did things to me too—”

“You forget your place!” Potter yelled, jerking his arm out of Draco’s grasp.

“Stop it, Harry, you don’t—”

Potter whipped out his wand. “ _Stupefy!_ ”

Draco felt himself slammed through the air, crashing into Potter’s bedside table with enough force to break it. His back and skull screamed in agony, and he clenched his teeth, determined not to cry out. A lamp fell and shattered inches from his head.

Potter looked down at him, as if he wanted to say something more, but pressed his lips in a firm line and stalked out.

His whole body hurt. Draco could not move, could not even struggle – he briefly wondered if his back had broken, but his leg twisted awkwardly to one side hurt quite badly, so he decided that couldn’t be the case.

The clock downstairs chimed twelve times. Footsteps stormed down the hallway and the front door slammed a moment later, leaving Draco alone in Harry’s house, immobilized with pain.

 _Well, happy Christmas,_ he whispered, tears welling in his eyes. The silent darkness absorbed his words.


End file.
